Tentative · System of a Down

131 bars at 158 BPM -- fast, and 3:19 of it without a break -- on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

MetalRock150 BPM and up
TEMPO
158 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
131
LENGTH
3:19
DIFFICULTY
72/100
THE BEAT

One bar, and 18% of the song

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 25-31, 53-59 and 61-67 -- 17.6% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

LOOP · 158 BPM
TENTATIVE · BARS 25-26
THE BEAT, WRITTEN OUT →
THE FILLS

Where it comes off the beat

2 fills to learn, played 3 times: bars 4, 109 and 110.

LOOP · 158 BPM
BAR 4 · LANDS ON BAR 5
LOOP · 158 BPM
BARS 109-110 · LANDS ON BAR 111 · PLAYED 2 TIMES
EVERY FILL, WRITTEN OUT →
THE SHAPE

How the song is built

131 bars across 11 sections: 95 keep time, 3 are fills, 13 are stops and 12 are silent. The longest unbroken stretch of time is bars 82-99.

PART D
PART E
CHORUS
PART E
CHORUS 2
OUTRO
OUTRO 2
9 groovesFIMED+4Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest

Questions

What BPM is Tentative?

158 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in thirty-second notes. At that speed the thirty-second notes are the whole difficulty, so the room will take it down to a quarter of it and climb back.

Is Tentative hard to play on drums?

72 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 55 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

131 bars, about 3:19 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 27 exercises over 8 sittings, about 27 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick. That is most of a full kit; the part moves around it rather than sitting in one place.

How many fills are in Tentative?

2 fills to learn, played 3 times: bars 4, 109 and 110.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 131 BARS ANALYSED
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